Good Communication is Not a Magic Marriage Solution

The first thing most husbands hear when they talk to a friend or counselor about their marriage is that you need to learn “good communication”.

Sound familiar?

Have you heard that better communication will fix the problems in your marriage?

If so, you’ve been lied to.

This extremely common piece of advice sounds like it should work in theory. In practice, it usually just increases the aggravation and depression that you feel every time you fail to engage with your wife.

Really think about it. I don’t know about you, but I’ve seen very few marriages that were saved thanks to “better communication”. And it’s not like open communication is that hard. I mean, come on, you just say what’s on your mind.

If good communication were a miracle marriage fix, do you honestly believe we’d have a ~50% divorce rate in America today?

Do you think that 50% of husbands are too dumb to say exactly what’s on their mind to their wives?

I think not.

Heck, if anything, we men need to be more careful about what we say to our wives and how we say it.

How many times have you spoken to your wife without thinking, and then realized how insensitive it sounded? How many times has your gut-instinct led you astray?

On top of that, for every time you notice your own vocal misstep, there are probably several more times that you’re ignorant of your mistake.

And common marriage advice for men says you need MORE of that?!

Why Doesn’t Open Communication Save Marriage Relationships?

As we said earlier, better communication sounds like logical marriage advice… It seems like it should work, right?

After all, every one of the healthy marriages that I know has very healthy communication between the two spouses. Therefore, shouldn’t practicing better communication make your marriage better?

In a perfect world, yes.

But, let me explain why this doesn’t work by giving you an analogy…

Please read the following analogy very carefully:

Maintaining Your Marriage is Like Maintaining Your Car…

Scenario #1

If you take really good care of your car – regular oil changes, tire rotations, inspections, the whole shebang – then you’ll rarely be surprised by an out-of-nowhere problem like engine failure or a fried transmission. You’ll catch 99% of your problems before they become problems, and you’ll know how to handle the rough spots when they come up.

When you’re committed to regular automotive maintenance, the most expensive thing you’ll ever pay for is an oil change, and your well-taken-care-of car will stay in good condition for a looooong time. Problems will be rare because you’ve been a good owner and kept the car well-maintained.

Okay? Following me so far? Take good care of your car and it’ll run more smoothly for a lot longer.

We all agree, yes? Pretty straightforward.

Now, let’s look at the other side…

Scenario #2

If you take bad care of your car – only ever giving it attention when it stops working or starts making funny noises – then you’ll find that your car troubles become more frequent and more expensive.

When you carelessly run your car into the ground, it’ll take a lot more than an oil change to get it working again. It becomes more likely that you’ll need expensive repairs like a transmission overhaul or camshaft replacement. These are usually repairs that could’ve been avoided entirely with the proper maintenance and foresight.

Do you see the analogy?

If you “maintain” a good marriage, then you’ll rarely have problems, and the ones you do have will be resolved quickly and easily.

However!

If you don’t keep up with the regular marriage maintenance, then it’ll take a lot more than communication improvement to get things running again.

In other words…

Good Communication Maintains Happy Marriages

It Doesn’t Fix Bad Ones

Does that make sense?

If your marriage is on the rocks right now, then good communication probably won’t fix it.

Of course, there are always some niche cases where this isn’t true, and I’m not saying that you should stop caring about what you say to your wife. I’m just saying that your hope shouldn’t lie in your words… Your actions are what will save your marriage.

No matter how clearly you communicate with your wife, it’s unlikely that you’ll change the way she feels about you or the way she feels about the relationship.

So, the question is:

If good communication won’t work,what will get your wife back?

Your goal is simple – you need to change the way your wife FEELS about you!

Reigniting attraction requires a deeper change than mere communication. You have to become the good husband that you were always meant to be. That man is in there somewhere; we just have to find him and bring him out.